Chicago sources have stated that American Civil
Liberties Union (ACLU) has taken the unusual step of issuing a travel advisory
to US citizens as well as visitors against travelling to the southern state of
Texas warning that “people of color” could be subject to profiling. The ACLU
“travel alert” follows the passage of Senate Bill 4 (SB4), the so-called
“sanctuary cities” bill, into law. Texas Governor Greg Abbot signed the bill
into law in a Facebook Live event earlier this week.

SB4 requires law enforcement agencies across the
state to honor U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detainers. These
are requests to hold someone in jail while their immigration status is checked
out. The SB4 legislation is in response to Texas cities like Austin, that have
come under fire for resisting full cooperation with ICE agents. SB4 penalizes
police officers for the failure to detain and turn over undocumented immigrants
to federal authorities.

ACLU said in a statement that “The law gives a
green light to police officers in the state to investigate a person’s
immigration status during a routine traffic stop, leading to widespread racial
profiling, baseless scrutiny, and illegal arrests of citizens and non-citizens
alike presumed to be “foreign” based on how they look or sound".

Texas is one of the states which have a large and
growing number of Indian Americans, along with other states like New York, New
Jersey, California and Illinois. Houston, the fourth largest city in the US,
has grown into one of the most ethnically-diverse cities in the country.

(USCIS) resumed the premium processing if H-1B Visa
Washington sources have stated that the US has resumed the premium processing of all H-1B visa petitions subject to the fiscal 2018 cap, five months after it was suspended to check the rush of work visas popular among Indian techies. The US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) resumed the premium processing on Monday. The suspension has, however, been revoked subject to a limit mandated by the US Congress. The FY 2018 cap has been set at 65,000 visas.